Sadly, in spite of vigorous opposition in many quarters
(including clear majorities in opposition in London and the North West) the decision
has been taken nationally to accept the disgraceful local government pay
proposals.
This means that we have decided to squander the effort that
went into the 10 July strike and collude in a continuing decline in the living
standards of the large majority of all our members in local government, UNISON’s
largest service group.
It is right to take a little time to be angry at the way
in which the continuous failure of our national leadership to be in any
meaningful way either “national” or a “leadership” has led us into this
predicament – but only a little time.
From Monday we have to focus on how we build and change
our trade union to represent the interests of local government workers. The
sensible, and widely supported, initiative of the Manchester branch to call for
a Special Service Group Conference gives us an opportunity which we must not
now waste.
In order to make best use of this opportunity we must
seek to understand the path that led us to this terrible outcome, including not
only the lack of meaningful national leadership, but also the retreat and
decline of workplace organisation and the unevenness of our organisation (and
combativeness) within and between our Regions and our branches.
If we are to retain national pay bargaining (and I
believe we should try) then we must redesign pay consultation procedures to
prevent the deliberate sabotage of our members’ sacrifice and action which took
place in this case.
Having seen that we cannot rely in any way upon our a
UNISON Centre more interested in gazing at its own collective navel from the
vantage point of the Great White Elephant of the Euston Road, we also need to
bring branches together before National Delegate Conference in order to
redirect our trade union’s resources to the levels of the union where some good
may be done.
This goes way beyond a restructuring or unification of
those who have traditionally see ourselves as “the left”. We are at the
beginning of a process which will determine whether UNISON has a meaningful and
relevant future, and all those who want a trade union which knows how to fight
for our members – and therefore want that future – need to draw together in our
common interest and in the interests of UNISON members.
1 comment:
Extraordinary! I agree with almost everything you say here Jon. I'd be interested to learn how you might reorganise Unison. It is clearly not fit for purpose.
Public sector workers are not a band of brothers with common cause; Not like the miners, steelworkers, or train drivers.Many public sector workers, the baby boomers, have done, and are still doing, incredibly well.They can afford to vote for moderation now. They care nothing for their fellow workers on the low=paid front line. We are not united. We live in different worlds.
Unison certainly doesn't work for me. I have paid my union dues for the past sixteen years and become materially worse off in every single one of those years. You will no doubt urge me to stay on and fight but I simply can no longer afford to pay £10 a month for nothing but empty rhetoric from the very rich and wholly ineffectual Mr. Prentis.
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